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Last night, the Bruins won 5-1, forcing a Game 7 in the Stanley Cup Final. Today is a good day to be a Bruins fan. But last week, not so much. The morning after the Boston Bruins lost an extremely frustrating Game 5 of the Stanley Cup to the St. Louis Blues, I started my day like every politically-conscious American—by checking Twitter.
I was treated to a video of two Bruins fans arguing, then one threw the majority of a beer on the other, and the two men proceeded to kind of fight each other. Fat fists flew awkwardly through the air like the time I tripped and dropped an entire baked ham. The men tried to imitate the hockey players by pulling their opponent’s sweaters over their heads because of course they both had jerseys.
It struck me that this video boiled down to two men expressing their overwhelming emotions by trying to fist each other while taking their clothes off.
Then I realized that, despite being a bandwagon Bruins fan, I don’t want the Bruins to hoist the Cup.
And it’s not because of the team; it’s because of their fans. While all Boston sports fans have become insufferable, Bruins are the worst of all. As a fellow Bostonian, taking the T home after a Bruins game was like boarding the train through Bro Hell. They get drunk, harass everyone, and are always riled up and looking for any excuse to vent the frustration that comes from having to go home to their unfulfilling lives.
I only ever wanted to get home after a long day of work and night classes. But instead of peacefully reading, everyone in the train car was subjected to very loud conversations between the small group of dude-bro-guys. All of these conversations followed the same track: express frustration that the refs did/didn’t make a call, parrot something they heard on sports radio, start yelling at each other in increasingly hostile tones until they realize that they agreed with each other, and then break down into incredibly misogynistic “locker room talk” about how much they love vaginas and totally aren’t curious about exploring each other’s bodies.
While most of these buttholes were harmless-though-loud drunks, there was the occasional asshole that was amped up from the game and looking for a fight. I just wanted to get home safely but I always had to be ready to defend myself. Thankfully, they never came near me. They assumed I was one of them, probably since I looked enough like a bro to escape their scrutiny.
Most fans, of any team, are just hoping that their team has a decent season, giving them something watchable to distract them from all the terrible stuff in the news. But the worst thing about today’s Bruins fans is that they feel entitled to victory. In the last 20 years, the Patriots have won six Super Bowls and the Red Sox have won four World Series. Bruins fans feel like they should just be handed a championship at this point, like they deserve it despite not having earned it. “What the hell, we’re the Bruins (fans), we have this long history of big name players, just give us stuff for being us,” is pretty much the sentiment.
Of course, not all Bruins fans are like this, but the ones that do feel this way are very vocal and give us all a bad name. But in this series, Bruins fans just don’t seem to understand the game as well as the Blues fans, who have been waiting for a championship way longer than any Bruins fan. The impatience is a clear sign that Bruins fans don’t understand what it’s like to really want something.
If the Blues win the championship, I’ll be happy for them and their fans since I know how good it feels to watch your team win. Every sports fan should get a chance to see their team win at some point in their lives. We need more sports fans to adopt this mentality of acceptance and goodwill. It’s not always your turn.
Do you see where this is going yet? Because it’s not actually about sports at all.
Looking at this all as a Bruins fan is like how I look at the organizers of these “Straight Pride Parades,” one of which happens to be in Boston. Coincidence? No, Boston sucks.
But these assholes celebrating their Straight Pride are essentially complaining that their lives aren’t hard enough; they want a parade for living a life without being discriminated against. Like Bruins fans, these straight people just don’t have the perspective.
Of course, not all straight people are assholes, but we need more straight people to step up and be allies when we see ridiculous entitlement and ignorance like this. You don’t have to be perfect, even. You just have to try. Many of us are still trying to understand the importance and dynamics of gender and sexual identity, but I only really understand like 10 percent of what I should know. It’s not that I’m unintelligent or not trying; it’s that I don’t have the perspective. I do, however, have enough perspective to admit my ignorance and do what I can to make life easier for everyone.
These Straight Pride Parades are essentially Pity Parties.
Instead of participating in the joy of others, these people are focusing on themselves, marginalizing the struggles of others while inflating their own trivial troubles.
Look, no one wants to hang out with people who wallow in woes. You don’t have to root for another team, but instead of complaining about your own losses, let’s celebrate each other’s wins.
TL;DR He was a str8r boy. Everyone said see ya l8r boy.
P.S. Vaccinate your kids.
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